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Course Catalog:
A second programming course which reinforces the programming constructs learned in CS 2370 and covers more advanced programming techniques. Students learn about the client/server paradigm, how to create graphical user interfaces and event-driven program structure, and how to use basic data structures such as stacks, queues, lists, and trees. Students write applications using basic networking and multithreading techniques. Three lecture hours and 2 hours of computer lab. Falls and Springs.
Prereq: CS2370

Course Info #

• Instructor: Nat Tuck
• Email: <nathaniel.tuck@plymouth.edu>
• Office: D&M 305
• Lecture: Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 11:15am-12:05pm
• Labs:
  • Section 01: Tuesday at 10-11:40am
  • Section 02: Tuesday at noon-1:40pm
• Final Exam: Mon Dec 9 @ 11am - 1:30pm
• Course Site: https://homework.quest/ click “cs2381”
• Office Hours: See course site.

Student Learning Outcomes #

Successful students will:

• Understand how to structure data in computer programs, including the roles of several common data structures.
• Be comfortable writing medium-sized programs in a modern programming language like Java.
• Be able to determine the computational complexity of many operations and algorithms.
• Practice reading and understanding computer code.
• Consider creative solutions to programming problems.

Texts #

There is no required textbook for this course.

We may use one or more freely licensed online textbooks for some assignments.

Grading #

The number of points available in an assessment may (or may not) exceed the denominator used in the grade calculation. For example, if the final exam offers 104 points out of 100, then a perfect score would count as 26% towards the final course grade.

Letter grades

≥ 93 → A, ≥ 90 → A-,
≥ 87 → B+, ≥ 83 → B, ≥ 80 → B-,
≥ 77 → C+, ≥ 73 → C, ≥ 70 → C-,
≥ 67 → D+, ≥ 63 → D, ≥ 60 → D-,
else (< 60) → F

Labs

Each week there will be a lab assignment to complete during the lab period. Labs will only be accepted before the end of the lab period, and only when submitted from a lab workstation.

The purpose of this course is to teach the skill of computer programming. Students need to practice writing programs themselves without external help. Therefore, the following rules apply to lab sessions:

• Personal electronics may not be used. If they are brought to lab, they must be kept in a closed container like a backpack.
• Only approved web resources can be used: Inkfish, the course site, provided lecture notes, the textbooks(s), the offical programming language documentation, and anything directly linked from the current lab assignment.
• Students who intentionally or repeatedly violate this policy will be asked to leave and will not be able to complete that lab assignment.
• These specific rules may be overridden by the instructions in individual lab assignments.

Homework

Each week there will be a homework assignment to be completed outside of class.

Minimizing the use of external resources is recommended, and academic honesty rules will be strictly enforced.

Homeworks submitted after the deadline loses 1% per hour late (round up).

There may be extra assignments that are counted as homework for administrative tasks like completing course evaluations.

Inkfish and Script Grades

Labs and homework will be provided through an online web application called Inkfish and must be submitted through the same system. Emailed work will not be accepted unless requested beforehand.

A portion of your grade for labs and homework assignments may be generated by an automatic grading script which runs when you submit your work. Unless there is a clear bug 🪳 in the script, the script output is that portion of your grade and will not be adjusted manually. You are being graded on getting the script to give you points. You should review the output, make corrections, and resubmit before the deadline if you are unhappy with the script results.

Script grades will be reduced if you submit work inconsistent with the text or spirit of the assignment, such as hard-coding outputs that should be calculated.

Teams

You may be assigned to work with a partner, in which case pair programming is required. In assigning partners, sometimes there ends up being a team of one or (under rare circumstances) three.

All team members are responsible for and get credit for any work submitted as a team.

Final Exam

The final exam will be on paper. Be prepared to write both English and code.

No electronics are allowed in exams.

Graded exams can be reviewed during office hours or by appointment.

Grade Appeals

If you think you recieved an incorrect grade, send me an email describing why your grade is wrong and how you think it should be corrected.

If the grade isn’t clearly wrong, I will ask you to stop by my office hours so we can discuss the issue in more detail.

Requests to correct grades must be sent within a week of the grade being posted and before the start of finals week or they won’t be considered unless there is a good reason to make an exception.

Fair Grading Policy

All grading in this class is subject to the university Fair Grading Policy.

Excused Absences

If you are unable to submit an assignment or take an exam on time due to a circumstance covered by the university Excused Absence Policy, contact the professor to discuss making up the assignment. If you are able to contact the professor before the assignment deadline or exam date you must do so.

Late Registration

If you register late for the course please contact the professor to discuss completing any missed assignments as soon as possible and whether you need an extension on at most one additional homework.

Course Evaluations

Course evaluations can be a valuable tool to determine how the semester went. They’re more useful with a higher response rate, so please complete your course evaluation survey.

Resources #

Tutoring #

There is evening tutoring in the lab classroom. See the course website for more details. The PASS Office also offers individual tutoring.

Accomodations #

Plymouth State University is committed to providing students with documented disabilities equal access to all university programs and facilities. If you think you have a disability requiring accommodations, you should contact Campus Accessibility Services (CAS), located in Speare (535-3300) to determine whether you are eligible for such accommodations. Academic accommodations will only be considered for students who have registered with CAS. If you have authorized CAS to electronically deliver a Letter of Accommodations for this course, please communicate with your instructor to review your accommodations.

Academic Integrity #

Please carefully read and be familiar with the unversity Academic Integrity Policy. Especially don’t do any of the things in the list of examples of academic integrity violations. Make sure to review the penalties for repeated offenses.

The primary subject of this class is writing small computer programs. In order to learn that skill, you need to practice it by completing the programming assignments by writing code yourself (or with your team on team assignments).

The following things are obvious cheating:

• Submitting code that wasn’t written by you (or your team).
  • Two exceptions: Starter code; small examples in the official documention for the programming language or library we are using.
• Sharing your soluton code with other students (except teammates).
• Looking at other solutions to this or similar problems.
• Accessing unauthorized resources in a lab or exam.

Cheating will be handled as follows:

• During an exam or lab, if you are caught cheating or acting in a way that appears to facilitate cheating (e.g. using unauthorized electronics) you will be asked to leave and will not be allowed to complete the assignment.
• The default penalty for cheating on any assignment is zero grade on that assignment.

Partner assignment are expected to be done working together. You have at least some responsibility for any work submitted for your team.

You may not post solutions for assignments in this class publicly.

Tentative Schedule #

The initial plan is for homework to be due at 11:59pm on Monday.

• † No class on Monday, Sep 02 (Labor Day) or Monday, Nov 11 (Veterans Day)
• ‡ No class Wed, Thu, Fri (Thanksgiving)